After a week of violence that left Bangkok's commercial heart smouldering in ruins alongside Thailand's land of smiles reputation, there are few winners and even less certainty about where the country goes from here than when the whole mess began.

The coalition government looks stable for now but a lasting solution to the fissures in Thai society and loss of faith in the political process looks further away than ever.

The tough final military action to clear the anti-government protest site helped prime minister Abhisit Vejjajiva salvage his credentials with his supporters. The redshirts themselves, or at least the thugs, vandals and arsonists among them who set Bangkok ablaze, also bolstered his position. Many in the capital who had been partially sympathetic to the red cause were shocked by the apocalyptic turn of the endgame.

Abhisit is talking reconciliation and rebuilding. But with 82 dead and nearly 1,800 injured and redshirts, still defiant and angry, returning to heroes' welcomes across the north and north-east, it is hard to see how the process begins – particularly when Abhisit, loathed by a majority of the electorate, is unable to show his face in many parts of the country.

Not that his nemesis Thaksin Shinawatra, widely assumed to have bankrolled the two-month protest, is any more of a unifying figure. The anarchy of the past days has driven many previously non-committed Thais firmly into the anti-Thaksin camp. Nationwide he still commands loyalty, but his return to politics would simply lead to new yellowshirt protests.

The seemingly obvious way to hit the reset button would be to call new elections and Abhisit has hinted at that, saying he will return to the five-point road map that was to have delivered a fresh poll by 14 November. But no sooner had he made the promise than his finance minister Korn Chatikavanij raised doubts about the date, saying he feared violence in any campaign. Coalition partner Banharn Silpa-archa has raised similar concerns.

In any case, it is far from clear that a new vote would change very much – or even if the redshirts believe in that any more. One of their chief complaints is that they keep electing governments which are either thrown out by coups or dubious legal processes.

So while a fresh election may lance the boil in Thailand for a time, there are no guarantees that such a decision in itself is a longterm answer to the country's deep problems. And as the smoke clears over the rubble in Bangkok, it is also not possible to identify any Thai political leader able to provide the necessary circuit-breaker to bring an end to the crippling cycle that has paralysed the country for so long.